Candidate Filing Week

Throughout filing week we will keep the conversation going about candidates who have filed and what to look forward to during the 2014 political season.

3rd & 7 37yd

3rd & 7 37yd

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The biggest, most recent news is the filing by Tina Robinson, a Republican, to run against Russ Hauge for prosecutor. Hauge's race four years ago was one of the more high profile races, particularly because of issues surrounding the Kitsap Rifle & Revolver Club. Here we are four years later and those issues have not gone away.

Two other candidates have filed today and both are in the 35th Legislative District. We expected Josiah Rowell, a Republican joining Dan Griffey in the race to challenge Democrat incumbent Kathy Haigh in House Position 1. In Position 2 Democrat Tammey Newton from Allyn is challenging Republican Drew MacEwen for his seat in the Legislature.

Local attorney Tina Robinson today filed as a candidate forthe office of Kitsap County Prosecutor.“I am running for Kitsap County Prosecutor because I believe theresources of the county should be more effectively and efficiently used”,stated Robinson. Robinson hasresided in Kitsap County for nearly 20 years, where she practices law and hasserved in community organizations

Robinson supervised a multi-million dollar budget and 48employees while serving as the business manager at Group Health’s Silverdaleand Poulsbo clinics. Afterreceiving her law degree from Seattle University, she began practicing with aprivate firm, then focused her practice to serve those who were unable to defendthemselves in Kitsap County.

“The policies of the Prosecuting Attorney’s office shouldreflect a concern for justice, a compassion for victims, and a priority onthose crimes involving victims”, added Robinson. “I believe that my life experiences, role as a defenseattorney, and my experience in administration and management make me uniquelyqualified.”

Tina Robinson received a Management degree from Old DominionUniversity prior to her legal studies.Her legal practice has included a range of criminal cases including drugs,property crimes of every sort, domestic violence, assaults, robberies, sexoffenses and murder.

“Our focus should be on the challenges that the people ofKitsap County face which are very different than those of surrounding counties,”suggested Robinson. “As a resultof my work serving as a Public Defender, I have a unique perspective of howcases are managed by the Prosecutor’s Office from start to finish. I’mespecially concerned that the Prosecutor’s Office does not focus more onproperty crimes, and the victims whose lives are often severely damaged as aresult.”

Robinson resides in Port Orchard with her husband, Ken. They enjoy the outdoors, and are avidhikers, bikers, runners and skiers. They have two grown children, and areactive in the Harper Community Church.Tina has also served on the Board of Directors for Peninsula CommunityHealth Service, and remains engaged in community health issues.

Ed Wolfe just filed. We have at least two people in the county commissioner race. Wolfe, as you may recall, is a Republican. His opponent is Linda Streissguth, appointed early this year to replace Josh Brown. Those of you on Bozeman watch are still waiting.

Tim Sheldon has filed. He joins Irene Bowling, a Democrat, and Travis Couture, a Republican. Every partisan race has a primary as long as there are two candidates. This one and the House race for Position 1 in the 35th have three candidates. So someone's campaign will end in August in each race. Meanwhile in the 23rd, both legislators up for re-election remain unopposed so far.

Nathan Schlicher, Democrat in the 26th, is in. He'll be running against Jesse Young and Bill Scheidler. There are still some races in which I'm expecting to see candidates. I have reason to assume Drew Hansen and Sherry Appleton will have opponents for their House seats in the 23rd. We should expect a third county assessor candidate. We might see another commissioner candidate.

Things move pretty slowly in the middle of filing week. The flurries happen on Monday, when those who know they're running rush to file, and Friday when those who aren't sure or are wanting to be part of the final splash finally sign up.We are still expecting to see new filings in the 23rd Legislative races and in county government. Jeffrey Wallis registered with the Public Disclosure Commission to run for coroner, but hasn't officially filed with the county yet.

I'm out in Kingston at the moment, which is appropriate because a Kingston guy just signed up to run for a seat in the state Legislature. Scott Henden, currently a North Kitsap School Board member, filed to run as a Republican against incumbent state Rep. Sherry Appleton of Poulsbo. Appleton is a Democrat who has held the seat since 2005. The district hasn't had a Republican representing it since 2006 when Christine Rolfes unseated Bev Woods. It's a pretty Democratic district, but one Democrat recently told me a good Republican can win there. Henden had been a fairly regular critic of the Legislature from his seat on the school board. He has knocked it for not meeting it's obligation to schools specifically, but more generally for it's spending practices.

I sure hope Ms. Robinson makes an issue of the 15 years and half a million or OUR tax dollars Hauge has spent persecuting Marcus Carter — in spite of losing three times in court with Carter acting as his own attorney. When he couldn't win in court, Hague unleashed the DCD on Carter and the Kitsap Rilfe and Revolver Club in an attempt to bankrupt them. The injustice of this — not to mention the monumental waste of our tax dollars, is simply unconscionable. It's time for a change.

So, I've been on Casey Kasem duty and have been away. In the meantime the prosecutor race just became more interesting with the addition of Bruce Danielson, running as an independent. Word on the street is there might be more candidates filing to run in that race, the one for prosecutor. You think we should start a new poll?

Yesterday I completely missed Kelly Emerson's filing for county auditor because her filing appeared late in the afternoon. She's a Republican running against Dolores Gilmore, a Democrat who manages the county's election office. Jeff Wallis, who expresses no party preference, is running for coroner, something we mentioned here yesterday because of his PDC filing.

John "Zamboni" Scannell of Bremerton is running for state Supreme Court against the woman who wrote the opinion in the court's decision to disbar him in 2010. It was a 6-2 decision that came down to Scannell only getting disbarred because he delayed the investigation over five years. The court said the original infractions investigated would not have merited him being disbarred. Judges who disagreed with the majority said suspension might have been appropriate, but not disbarment.

Candidate filing this week has already given us a more exciting primary than expected. Fridays typically generate the big surprises. Bozeman watch continues. At least one more person should be filing in the 23rd. A couple of county races still only have one candidate. It's shaping up to be quite the year.

As it turns out, I was gone on Friday and it looks like Friday was relatively quiet. It would have been nice to add Bob Scales' name to the survey above. In fact, let me do that before this thing closes.